Artists in Residence

From Bedtime Story to Bedtime Song

I recently picked up a copy of Gregory, the Terrible Eater at a used bookstore.  It is one of my childhood favorites so when I found it for less than $2.00, I jumped at the chance to be able to share such a fun book with my children.  The book has quickly become one of Little Ish's favorites.

When Little Ish latches onto a book, parts of the text often seep into his daily life.  It is not abnormal to overhear him reciting books word for word as he plays.  Sometimes he seamlessly slips a quote or two into his conversations with me and Ish.  Wednesday night at bedtime Gregory, the Terrible Eater brought the carryover from book to daily life to a whole new level.  As I started to sing Little Ish his bedtime songs, he stopped me and requested that I sing a different song. When I asked him what song he would like, he responded, "Gregory, the Terrible Eater".  I told him I didn't know that song, but he persisted in his request.  In hopes of having a peaceful bedtime, I made this little ditty up off the top of my head:

Gregory, the Terrible Eater,

All he wants to do is eat fruits and vegetables

Gregory, the Terrible Eater,

His mom and dad were worried

So they brought him to the doctor

Gregory, the Terrible Eater

Why won’t he just eat a tin can?

(Why won’t he just eat a tin can?)

 Little Ish was pleased and the song is now requested multiple times per day.  As I laid him in his crib that night, his last words to me were, "Mom, I'm an average goat".  Yup, books really do trickle into every corner of life if you let them.

Little Ish's Blueberry Muffins

One of Little Ish's favorite activities is to help me bake; he especially likes to bake muffins.  A few weeks ago when we were making my great-grandmother's blueberry muffins, Little Ish asked me if we could alter the recipe a bit.  He really wanted to add cinnamon.  It sounded good to me so I agreed to try it out.  The results were delicious!  A new favorite recipe has been born.  

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Little Ish's Blueberry Muffins

Makes 1 dozen

Preheat Oven to 375°F

Sift:

 1 ½ c. flour

½ c. sugar

a pinch of salt

1 Tbsp.  baking powder

1 tsp. cinnamon

Beat together:

1 egg

½ c. milk

¼ c. oil

Combine wet and dry ingredients.

Only mix them enough to wet all ingredients.

Add 1 cup of fresh or frozen blueberries*. 

Bake for 20-25 minutes

* We have been using  Wyman's Frozen Wild Blueberries as blueberries clearly are not in season right now. 

A Sweater, a Shawl, and More Fermentation

This week has been productive in terms of knitting.  I am 99% finished with the Baby Surprise Jacket.  I just need to finish weaving in the ends and to sew on some buttons.  Just a word of advice, if you find something you really like on etsy, don't pin it on pinterest; it's almost a guarantee that someone will buy it before you do.  This is what happened with the buttons I was hoping to get for this sweater (and on several other occasions); I think I have finally learned my lesson.


This morning I started working on my next project.  I am knitting a Lacie Prairie Shawl.  I wanted a warm and practical shawl and this pattern definitely fits the bill.  Lets hope I finish it before all of the cooler days of early spring have passed.  It'd be a shame to have to wait until autumn to try it out.

Reading wise, I am still reading and enjoying The Art of Fermentation.  I am getting more and more excited about fermentation.  I just need to figure out what I want to ferment; I am drawn to the idea of pickling lemons so perhaps that is where I will start.

Want to read about what other people are knitting and reading?  Join Ginny over at Small Things for her weekly Yarn Along!

Letters and Numbers

Little Ish learned all of his uppercase letters by the time he was 19 months old and then spent almost a year refusing to believe in the existence of lowercase letters other than a and q.  It wasn't until Christmas when he received a Melissa and Doug See and Spell from his cousins that he started believing in lowercase letters.  I decided to copy the Alphabet Egg-Stravaganza idea that I found on this blog to help him learn all of his lowercase letters (not just the ones that came with his See & Spell).  I did have to wait a couple months until their were Easter Eggs at the dollar store, but it was well worth the wait.  Since the eggs came in packs of 18, I had 10 eggs left over from making his alphabet game so I made a similar one with numbers where I wrote the number on the top half of the egg and the corresponding number of dots on the bottom.  Both games have been a big hit!  On one morning Little Ish decided to add an extra element to his number eggs; he filled each egg with the correct number of Cheerios.

Fermentation, Vikings, and a Sweater

Since getting back to knitting after my long hiatus, I have cast on what purportedly will turn into a baby sweater.  I have been meaning to knit a Baby Surprise Jacket since before Lily was born.  I actually was talking to a friend to help me make sense of the pattern a couple of hours before I went into labor with Lily.  Not so surprisingly, I never made one for Liliana.  This sweater, provided that it doesn't turn out to be a failed attempt, will be going to my newest nephew.  Unlike the name of the sweater, it is not intended to be a surprise that I am knitting it.  After knitting baby blankets for his older siblings, I decided to deviate from tradition.  So far, the pattern is fairly easy almost to the point of being boring as it is all in garter stitch with 2 double decreases every other row.  I really like what it is supposed to look like when it is done though. I have started a search for the buttons for the finished product.  I am thinking wooden ones, but I am still not sure.

Aside from my knitting, I have been reading a lot.  I finished reading Enchantment earlier this week and found it to be both charming and well crafted.  I have now moved onto reading The Art of Fermentation by Sandor Ellix Katz.  I had been stalking amazon for a reasonably priced copy for well over a month and was very pleased to come across one last week.  I already am enjoying the writing and I am looking forward to putting some of what I learn to practice.

Little Ish and I are currently enjoying a longer read aloud together.  This week he pulled Voyage with the Vikings off of the bookshelf and asked me to read it to him.  The book is historical fiction and is part of the Adventures in Odyssey Imagination Station series.  So far we are really enjoying it.  I am not sure how much he is retaining of it from day to day, but since he wants me to keep reading, I figure he must be following it somewhat. I think after this book we might move onto something a little more classic though such as Winnie-the-Pooh.

To hear about other reading and knitting adventures, feel free to visit Ginny over at Small Things .

The Lily Phanatic

For those of you who are baseball fans,  you most likely have heard of the Philly Phanatic; for those of you who are not, I'll fill you in. He is the mascot of the Philadelphia Phillies.  When my Dad and one of my brothers visited last spring, they went to a Phillies game and brought back a somewhat ridiculous hat for my children.  It was neglected for months, but in the past few weeks Lily has grown attached to it.  She often runs up to me, hat in hand, yelling, "Hat! Hat!" until I put it on her head.  Little Ish has taken to calling her the Lily Phanatic.

And just in case you were wondering, we're still Red Sox fans through and through.